In copending patent application Ser. No. 08/557,269, filed Nov. 14, 1995, U.S. Pat. No. 6,047,165 and entitled, "WIRELESS, FREQUENCY-AGILE SPREAD SPECTRUM GROUND LINK-BASED AIRCRAFT DATA COMMUNICATION SYSTEM," the disclosure which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety, a ground data link system provides a wireless mechanism for transferring data files to and from an aircraft while the aircraft is on the ground at ground data link equipped airports. Flight performance data representative of aircraft flight performance is obtained during flight of the aircraft and stored in a data store.
The system works in an unlicensed frequency band with low power limits having limited ranges. The system is typically used as an airport equipped with ground data link equipment. After the aircraft lands at the airport equipped with the ground data link equipment, the spread spectrum transceiver coupled to the archival data store downloads the flight performance data to an airport based spread spectrum transceiver. However, the system is predominantly limited to downloading and uploading data after the aircraft has landed at the destination airport. This may not be advantageous for all applications.